Chapter 5: The Uprising
The liberation of Warsaw was nearing. The question as to who would be the liberator became a matter of great political importance and prestige. Armia Krajowa, loyal to the Polish government in exile, made extensive preparations for an uprising against the Germans. This was planned to take place when the Soviet Army reached Warsaw. Armia Krajowa assumed that the rapid progress of the Soviets would bring prompt relief to the struggling insurgents. This assumption, however, was not backed by any agreement or coordination. On the contrary, as the Soviet Army approached Poland, relationships between the Polish government in exile and Stalin deteriorated. The break was complete on July 22nd, 1944, when the Soviets created a communist Polish government in the first major Polish city they liberated - Lublin. On July 30, when the Soviet Army reached the eastern outskirts of Warsaw, this section of the front line came to a standstill.
Tuesday, August 1, 1944. At 41 Marszalkowska Street we were alone. The Bajers had gone to the country, leaving us enough food for a few days.
We were not particularly surprised to hear the first shots and explosions. In occupied Warsaw there was nothing unusual about them. As the sounds of battle continued, we falsely assumed that the front line had just began to cross the city, and that we were in the middle of the liberation process. This assumption was an expression of our wishful thinking, but was not realistic. The River Vistula divides Warsaw into two parts: the much larger western part where we lived, and the eastern borough of Praga. Two days earlier, the Soviets had still been at the eastern approaches of Praga; they had not entered the city, and obviously, could not yet have crossed the Vistula. In fact, the explosions we heard were the sounds of the Uprising against the Germans. The street loudspeakers ceased to function, and with the Bajers away in the country, we had no information about what was going on.
For the past several months, Stella and her children had been living in Praga, and her visits had become less frequent. While battle raged in the streets, we certainly did not expect her to come. Nor did we see Jozek. He was now totally occupied with the Armia Krajowa, serving both as a surgeon and as the Deputy Commanding Officer of the No. 1 Field Hospital "Blaszanka". The hospital opened in an old factory in the Powisle Czerniakowskie section of Warsaw. On August 22, the Commanding Officer of "Blaszanka", Dr. Piotr Załęski, was wounded and Jozek ("Dr. Przyzycki") took over his duties. Jozek spoke fluent German. On September 17, when the hospital was captured by the Germans, he conducted negotiations with their authorities, and managed to convince them that all the insurgents had left, and the remaining patients were civilians and wounded German soldiers. As a result, continuous operation of the hospital was permitted until its evacuation on September 26. At that time, one of the nurses informed the Germans that Dr. Przyzycki was a Jew, and on September 27 he was murdered ("executed") in the back yard of the students' dormitory at Narutowicz Square. While all this was happening, we did not know anything about his whereabouts or about his involvement with the Armia Krajowa, because he had never told us anything about it. An exhaustive description of his activities both as Jozef Klinger (his real name) and as Jozef Przyzycki (his pseudonym) can be found in the rich documentary literature about the Warsaw Uprising. 4, 5, 6
The war raged in the streets. Everybody who was not fighting, went to hide in basement shelters. We remained on the second floor. We did not even consider leaving the apartment without positive knowledge that Warsaw had indeed been liberated and that the Germans had gone. The Nazis would surely have killed us. We took our chances with the bombs and the bullets, and decided to remain in hiding until the fighting was over. Our food should suffice for 3 or 4 days, so we thought there would be no problem. But as the days passed, the cacophony of war did not abate. The shelling and street fighting increased daily. We began to feel the first pangs of hunger.
We also began to feel more direct effects of the war. The bombardment intensified and damage was heavy and widespread. Our house suffered several hits. The roof was blown off. A gap was blown in one of our walls, and whenever rain fell, we got wet. Our window-panes were all broken. Shrapnel and bullets hit our room. On one occasion a bullet pierced the wallet in the pocket of my pants, perforating all my documents and photographs, but, luckily, I was not injured. On another occasion, after a night of heavy shelling, many pieces of shrapnel were found on the floor and imbedded in the wall opposite the window. One large piece landed neatly on my pillow, milimeters away from my head (Fig. 29). Yet strangely enough, none of this scared us. It seemed that we would be a little safer sleeping on the floor, close to the wall under the window, rather than in our beds. So we put the mattresses on the floor, and slept near the wall. We did it for safety, by cold calculation and without any fear. We were afraid only of being discovered and captured by the Nazis. The flying bullets were our friends; they brought us the hope of liberation. And they did not injure any of us.
God's personal interference? I am not religious. I believe in mathematical equations, chemical formulas, and the laws of physics and biology, not in metaphysical forces of any kind. But of one million residents of Warsaw, most of them in shelters, 200,000 perished during the two months of the Uprising. One fifth of the population! Houses around us were hit and destroyed, some burned to the ground. At the same time we were hiding on the second floor of an old building, exposed and being shelled from three sides. Shrapnel, scores of bullets and shreds of grenades penetrated our room and caused a lot of material damage. Yet none of us suffered any injury. Can this be scientifically explained? (Fig. 30).
Fig. 30: The front of our house faced the Savior's square, the left side Marszalkowska Street, the right side 6th of August Street. Shelling came from these three sides. Photograph taken 50 years later
Worse by far than the fear of shrapnel, was our hunger. Our food was supposed to last for four days. It lasted six. Since we were confident that the street fighting would end shortly, we did not try to save what little we had. When we had finished all our food, we made a thorough search of the kitchen cupboards. We found some sugar, some saccharine pills (for saving sugar, not for diet - this was half a century ago!), some poppy-seeds, a pound of peas, and a bottle of vinegar. We were not a very demanding group. The simple mixture of dry poppy-seeds and sugar would have made us an excellent dessert, had there been some dish to precede it. But there was nothing else, so we ate that as the main dish. Tosia made a large amount of soup from the peas. This was supposed to last us for several days. Unfortunately, she did not take into account the heat of mid-August. There were no electric refrigerators in Poland in 1944. Two days after it was made, the soup had a very unpleasant smell, but we were hungry, and ate it anyway. The next day we all had diarrhea; mine was particularly severe and bloody. The following day, an incredible stench filled the kitchen, and the remainder of the soup had to be thrown out. Thinking constantly of food, we recalled the paper bags filled with leftover bread which little Hania had not finished for lack of appetite, and which Mrs. Bajer refused to throw out - the famous "gifts of God". Those leftovers, moldy and covered with dust, now became real gifts of God. They were dry, but much tastier than the stinking pea-soup, and we consumed them to the last crumb. It is amazing to recall how tasty they were! Eventually, there was nothing edible left.
As the days passed, we developed a kind of mental block. We were unable to talk or think about anything other than food. I thought of eating while awake, dreamed of it while asleep. A particularly favorite topic of my dreams concerned the dry salami sandwiches which I had eaten in the shelter in June, 1941, when the Germans were bombarding and approaching Lwow. I would have given years of my life for a slice of that salami. In order to feel something in my mouth, I began to suck the corner of my bedsheet, while imagining salami. But neither the sheet nor the dreams could provide calories.
Bowel movements became very irregular. My excrement consisted mostly of blood and mucus. Weakness began to overpower us all. Rising from a chair became a major effort. When I stood, I avoided sitting down, realizing that after a while there would be a need to rise again, and this was so difficult... Even more difficult was rising from lying position. Therefore, it was better to sit than to lie. Looking in the mirror was scary: I saw a skeleton covered with pale skin, and long, unevenly cut hair - Gabriel's imperfect job as a barber. My efforts with his hair were not much better. We did not have scales, therefore I can only guess that my weight must have been at the most around 28 or 30 kg (60-65 lbs).
In the second half of September the exhaustion was almost beyond comprehension. We all lay in bed, disregarding the bullets, shrapnel and explosions, thinking obsessively about food. The only thing left that could be put into our mouths and swallowed was the vinenegar and saccharin pills, which we had not yet consumed. Tosia put the saccharine pills into the vinegar, stirred, and divided the potion into four small bottles. There were about 100 ml (a little over 3 ounces) in each bottle, and we each got our own "last supper". Lying in bed and trying to raise the small bottle to the mouth demanded an incredible amount of effort. I had to use both my hands, in order not to drop it. It was the end of September. Our ordeal of starvation had lasted a full eight weeks.
The fighting continued with no end in sight. We did not even have a vague idea about the situation among the battling sides, or how much longer it might last. It suddenly became clear that none of us could survive another week. We were dying from starvation. We realized this simultaneously, and started talking about it. Is it really better to starve to death, rather than risk being shot by the Nazis? Why continue to suffer?
September 30, 1944. While lying exhausted in bed, we deliberated about the possibility of disclosing ourselves to the neighbors, letting them know about our existence and starvation. Perhaps they would feed us, if they knew that we had not eaten a thing in two months? Perhaps the Nazis would not get us after all? And if they did, so what? We were dying anyway. The vote was unanimous. Everybody, including me, the youngest member of the assembly, not yet 15, voted for disclosure. Tosia, the only one still able to walk, went on the diplomatic mission of making our presence known to the local residents. How she was able to walk down three floors to the basement, and then back up again, I will never understand. She had a heart illness from which she died a short time after the war ended. But on that last day of September, she was the strongest of us all. She returned a few minutes later with three men of the "House Committee".
Looking at the pale skeletons we were, unable even to rise from bed, and seeing the degree of our emaciation, they appeared to be in shock. They looked at the bullet holes in the walls and expressed their amazement at our staying in this second floor apartment, without any protection, without any food. They assured us that we were in "independent Poland", not under Nazi rule. The apparent head of the group let us know that the Uprising was near collapse, and that the independence might not last much longer, but for the moment we had nothing to fear. He seemed to have some knowledge and understanding of medicine, and explained to us the importance of sufficient fluid intake. He spoke about digestion, and about the damage probably done to our gastrointestinal tracts. He was very kind, and had a calm, reassuring influence upon us. I never knew his name. They left.
15 minutes later, the same man, head of the House Committee, returned alone and brought us a pound of flour, a pound of sugar and one small uncooked potato. He apologized for the meagerness of the food he brought and explained that the entire population of Warsaw was starving. This was all he could give us for the moment. However, from now on we would participate with all the other house tenants in the regular distribution of food, however scarce.
Tosia, still the strongest of us all, started cooking. She sliced the potato and "fried" it in a pan on water, because no fat, not even a drop, was available. Each of us got two slices. Thin ones. These were the tastiest potato slices I have eaten in my whole life - better even than the salami of my dreams. From the flour and water Tosia baked flat bread, similar to "pita", which we ate fresh. For the next two days we received the same starvation rations as everybody else in the building. We were still hungry, very hungry, but we were no longer facing imminent death.
On October 2, 1944, after 63 days of heroic struggle, Armia Krajowa surrendered to the Germans. Under the conditions of surrender, the whole population of Warsaw had to be evacuated. A transfer camp was established in Pruszkow, a few kilometers west of Warsaw. We were evacuated on October 4.
* * *
In 1989, after four decades of absence, I came to Poland to attend a major Surgery Congress. I arrived in Warsaw in the last week of August. I took a taxicab from the airport to a prearranged private apartment at 10 Pulawska Street. This was 15 minutes walking distance away from the Savior's Square. From the windows of my room I could see the two spike-shaped towers of the Savior's Church. I wanted to see whatever remained of the places in Warsaw still fresh in my memory, but it was late evening, I was tired after the flight from Israel, and I fell asleep instantly. In the morning I went toward the Savior's Square, to the house at 41 Marszalkowska Street. A new roof had been built, and the holes and gaps in the walls had been repaired, but otherwise the appearance of the building had not changed (Fig. 30). I stood there and thought about our “quartet” with whom I had spent almost two years. Tosia died from a heart disease in the 1940s. Uncle Gabriel died from a myocardial infarction in 1956. I knew nothing about Leszek.
I entered the building, walked up to the second floor and knocked on the door of "our" apartment. An elderly lady, accompanied by her teenage granddaughter, opened the door. After introducing myself, I told her briefly the story of our hideaway in 1943-44. She let me see the apartment and our room. There was a novelty: a modern bathroom with a tub. In the living room I entered the balcony, which had been so strictly forbidden 45 years earlier. Looking at the Savior's Church, for the first time from the forbidden balcony, with open space around me, I felt chills going down my spine.
The lady did not know the Bajers, but she had heard about them. They were not alive. In the 1950s, Mr. Bajer had been riding on a crowded tram. He stood on the step, holding firmly to a handle, as many people in crowded trams do. A passing car hit him, he fell, and was killed. Mrs. Bajer died some years later. While we drank coffee, the lady suggested that I go down to the first floor, to see Doctor Mroczek. "He is still living here", she said. I explained that I never knew Dr. Mroczek; I lived in this house "illegally", never met any neighbors, and they never met me. But the lady insisted: "You should see Dr. Mroczek; he certainly remembers the Bajers with whom you lived.". Well, why not? I thanked her for letting me see the apartment so deeply engraved in my memory, the place for which I retained great sentiment.
On the first floor I noted a sign on the door:
Dr. Edmund Mroczek
Oto-laryngologist
After a short hesitation I knocked, and a young lady opened the door. I
introduced myself, and she led me "to the granddad". An aged,
venerable man was resting on the bed. He
insisted on rising from bed and meeting me at the
table, to which I helped him. I told him the story of
our group hiding with the Bajers, our experiences during the Uprising
and our starvation. He told me about some of his
experiences during the war and the German occupation. As we talked, it
suddenly occurred to me that I had seen this man before. He was not a
complete stranger. I do not know whether it was his voice, or
something in his eyes. The more we conversed, the more I
heard his voice, the stronger my impression became, until in a
sudden flash of insight I realized that this was the man who had
brought us the potato, sugar and flour while we were starving!
There was no doubt in my mind.
Returning to the subject of the Uprising,
I tried to remind him our "potato episode". He did
not remember it, but he confirmed my impression that it was he
who had regulated food distribution and other house affairs during the
Uprising. It was a very emotional moment. I felt
very grateful to the woman from the second
floor, who had convinced me, not without some difficulty, to meet
Dr. Mroczek. I could have missed him so easily!Oto-laryngologist
My first trip to Poland was extremely rewarding. I met old friends whom I had not seen for 40 years. I visited many places highly significant to me. I attended an excellent clinical congress, established important connections with the leaders of surgery in Poland, many of whom became my friends, and much more. But just meeting Dr. Mroczek, this humble, yet venerable man, would have made my entire trip worthwhile.
During the following years I became a frequent visitor to Poland. In the course of each visit I go on a pilgrimage to the house at 41 Marszalkowska Street. I do not enter any apartment; there is no need to bother the lady on the second floor, or Dr. Mroczek. I only want to see the staircase, the entrance door to "our" apartment, and Dr. Mroczek's sign. In April, 1993, I noted that the sign had disappeared from the door. I rang the bell, and another one of the Doctor's granddaughters (he had two, both living in his apartment) opened the door. She told me that her grandfather died in November, 1992, 87 years old. The conversation was very short - after all, I had come uninvited. But she gave me the telephone number of her father, Dr. Mroczek's son. In the evening I visited him at his home. The son, Dr. Janusz Mroczek, is a surgeon, and serves as head of the Department of Surgery in the Wolomin Hospital near Warsaw. He is 10 years my junior; when I was 14, he was 4 years old. For nearly two years we had lived in the same building, one flight of stairs apart, but we had never met, and never even knew about each other's existence. He gave me his father's photograph (Fig. 31) and told me about his parents. Dr. Edmund Mroczek had been wounded during the Warsaw Uprising. At the time he met us, he had already recovered from his wounds and subsequent surgery, and had taken over the functions of the house committee. His wife, Janusz's mother, also participated in the Uprising. Captured by the Nazis, she was murdered ("executed") by them. She was 29 years old. As an oto-laryngologist Dr. Mroczek accomplished a great deal. He educated a whole generation of laryngologists and developed the branch of pediatric laryngology, becoming the father of pediatric laryngology in Poland.
* * *
October 4, 1944. We walked slowly toward the transfer point. The four of us behaved as strangers, keeping a safe distance between us and not looking at each other. This way, if any one of us became "unmasked" as a Jew, the others would not be endangered. After a while we lost all contact.
The transfer point was marked by a barrier placed across the street. One side, guarded by the Armia Krajowa (Home Army insurgents) was decorated with the Polish flag, the other side with the German flag. "The border of independent Poland", I thought sadly, "now back to the Germans".
At the transfer point, everybody received half a loaf of bread, and every child was given in addition a can (about 300 ml) of condensed, very fatty milk - a gift of the International Red Cross. Very hungry, I immediately consumed the bread and milk. I knew that it was bad for my intestines, but the power of hunger was overwhelming, and I could not restrain myself.
We were loaded onto flatbed trucks which brought us to the transition camp in Pruszkow. We were still on the trucks, with no toilets available, when my bowels reacted to the fatty milk and fresh bread. I was overpowered by acute diarrhea and lost all control of my sphincters. All my excretions mixed with blood went straight into my pants. I had no change of clothing. I was alone, with no one to talk to, no one to complain to. Total loneliness. The entire trip probably lasted half an hour, but to me it seemed to last for ages. Finally, we reached the camp.
The makeshift transition camp was established in the hangars of a former airplane factory. Upon admission and registration, everybody was allotted a place on a cement floor. Food rations were issued two or three times a day, with long lines forming to the distribution points. A woman standing in line said that I reminded her of her son who had been taken to Germany for compulsory labor, and on several occasions she let me step in front of her, to the head of the line. We did not receive eating utensils, but the woman gave me a spoon, and I found an empty can of preserves, which I used as a plate.
My diarrhea slowed down considerably, and became exacerbated only after every meal. There were a few water taps and primitive toilets, but no other hygienic facilities. After all, we were supposed to stay there for only a few days.
The main role of the transition camp was to select young, able- bodied people of both sexes, for compulsory work in industry and on farms in Germany. The elderly, the children, and the ill were transferred to provincial towns and villages in occupied Poland. Still very ill, I went to the local clinic to see a doctor. A woman physician examined me. Her name was Dr. Balicka (in Polish, Balicka is the feminine version of Balicki - both are the same name). When she discovered that my name (Jozef Balicki, according to my Aryan documents) was the same as hers, she instantly inquired about my origins and a possible family relationship. Such a relationship, even if unproven, may have been helpful, but I was afraid of too much inquiry into my family origins. Dr. Balicka was from Torun in western Poland, which helped me to find an easy way out: according to my birth certificate, I was born in Brody, which was a far-away place, near the Soviet border, so the search for common roots did not go too far. At the end of our conversation, she gave me a certificate, stating that because of a heart illness, I was unable to work. It was certainly true that I was ill and emaciated, and could not work. I looked like a skeleton over which pale human skin was stretched. After a couple of days I was assigned to an infirm group, to be sent to Czestochowa. While in the transition camp I did not see my three companions from the Savior's Square.
The train to Czestochowa consisted of open cattle-cars. There were no seats, of course. One could sit on the floor, but the cars were very crowded, with not enough room for everybody to sit. Some people stood, exchanging places with others from time to time. I probably ate too much before boarding the train, and I paid for it dearly with another severe bout of bloody diarrhea. It was similar to my experience on the way from Warsaw to Pruszkow, but this was much worse, because the trip to Czestochowa lasted all night, and most of the time I could not sit. My buttocks and thighs burned from feces, my legs were weak, and I was close to collapse.
Upon arrival in Czestochowa I felt half-dead. We were transferred from the train to motor trucks, which would bring us to the camp for Warsaw refugees. I do not remember who arranged for my hospitalization and how, but before reaching the refugee camp, the truck stopped in front of a hospital, to unload me and several others. If my memory does not fail me, it was the Infant Jesus Hospital at Virgin Mary Avenue, the main street in Czestochowa. When the truck stopped, people asked us where we came from, and we answered proudly: "from independent Poland!".
4 T. Grigo: Na Gornym Czerniakowie (In the Upper Czerniakow),M.O.N., Warsaw, 1979.
5 T. Grigo: Powisle Czerniakowskie 1944, M.O.N., Warsaw, 1989.
6 M. Wisniewska and M. Sikorska: Szpitale Powstanczej Warszawy (Hospitals of the Insurgent Warsaw), Rytm-Polczek, Warsaw, 1991).